The Dry Stacking

The first round of concrete blocks was mortared to the footings; the footings had to be ground down so that it was level. Then the blocks were dry stacked. Sam and Ben had to make adjustments to get the blocks level and in a circle.

The dry stacked concrete blocks were then filled with dirt, which was tamped down solidly. The cracks between blocks were filled in with mortar and scraped flat.

Money Spent: $3584
$   52 800 lbs mortar mix
$3501 concrete blocks
$  15 wheels for grinder
$  16 table cut-off saw

The Drainage

The whole family worked on covering the drainage rock surrounding the perimeter with barley straw. We also covered the extruded polystyrene with a layer of sand.

That's Sam with our kids. He is a rockstar.

Go Team Win!

Money Spent: $718
$136 drainpipe
$ 71 drainpipe sleeves
$ 34 drainpipe couplings
$ 51 drainage PVC
$400 drainage rock
$  26 snap tee and end cap

The Blessing

Throughout the building process, I blessed the space.

I drew the cho ku rei spiral in the sand at the center of the house hole circle.

I wrote prayers and blessings all over the extruded polystyrene.

On Lughnasa (August 1), my daughter helped me create a blessing jar for the new house (and she created her own as well).

We crafted some "magic mortar" to put in the dry stacked concrete blocks.

I sprinkled garlic water around the perimeter of the house using driftwood sticks Sam found years ago as the "wand."

Money Spent: $0
I had all of the blessing materials and borrowed the markers for the "blueboard blessings."

The Footings

Sam and Ben created the forms for the footings. It took a lot of inventing and re-inventing and figuring out and brain work.

Once the forms were complete, they poured concrete into them. We were fortunate to have four very helpful men help: Cody, Jay, Ken, and Mark. It was impressive to observe them "dancing with concrete."

Ta da!

Money Spent: $1746

$ 114 materials for forms

$1632 concrete for footings

The Hole

Ben and Sam dug a huge hole in the little hill.

Ben and Sam filled the house hole with sand and rented a compactor to help make the "pit" very flat and even.

They covered the sand with black 6 mil polyethylene sheeting and then covered the sheeting with extruded polystyrene.

Money Spent: $3257
$  75 compactor rental
$ 200 sand
$ 248 6 mil polyethylene sheeting and stegotape
$2734 extruded polystyrene

The Plans

Though we had been researching earth shelters and buildings made of natural materials for years, we had minimal plans on paper. We used Rob Roy's Earth-Sheltered Houses: How to Build an Affordable Underground Home as our main guide and Sam drew up the plans at night after working all day on the "house hole."

Ben and Sam built a 1":1' model. The model gave us an idea of what would and what would not work. The original dimensions (1385 sq ft) would not provide a large enough living space, so we bumped the circle out, giving us nearly 1800 sq ft. Our daughter started spending considerable amounts of playtime creating her own house models.

Money spent: $0
The book was a wedding gift and the model was made of found and recycled materials.

The Land

Sam's family's farm is protected by a conservation easement and so there are rules and regulations about building on the land. Sam kept talking about "the hill" we would use to berm our home and by "hill" he apparently meant "slight rise in the landscape." The 2-acre building envelope is just off the dirt and gravel lane that runs through the farm. The view from every direction is breath-taking.

On Summer Solstice, we visited the barley field and small hill that would soon become our home. We asked permission from the land to build our house there and buried a 2014 penny as an offering.

Why yes, that is a mosquito net over my daughter's hat. I bought one for each of us to protect our faces from the hated creatures. I got a great deal on them and they made my summer significantly more pleasant.

Ben (left) and Sam (right) staked the property.

Sam built a little cairn at each corner of the property to mark the borders...and because he knew I think they are lovely.

The land conservation easement required a survey of the "building envelope." Our original survey used a triangle for the building area, but when we tried to place the well and septic system (which need to be placed deliberately), we realized a trapezoid was a better shape for our envelope. So we had to get a second survey.

I immediately started price checking the well. It turns out wells are very, very expensive. Nearly prohibitively expensive. And there's no guarantee that you will actually get water or that the water will be potable. After a lot of discussion and budgeting, we settled on a shallow well (60-80 feet).

We also needed to get permits and a soil test from the County in order to start work on the septic system and drainfield.

Money Spent: $1066
$310 septic permit
$235 County septic permit
$ 21 water test
$250 survey (triangle)
$250 survey (trapezoid)

One Year Later

It has been a year (and nearly four months) since my previous blog post.

A lot happened.

We had a baby. We tried to buy a house. We ended up being deceived ("swindled" is a good term) by the seller's real estate agent. I got laid off. It's a long long story--just trust me that you would be appalled, outraged, and very sad for us. There, I just saved us both a lot of time.

Things were going so very wrong for us that we decided maybe we weren't going in the wrong direction, maybe we were not headed down the right path, maybe our trajectory was wrong. The last time things went so spectacularly wrong for me, I needed to literally turn around, surrender, and let myself be moved by the Flow of the Universe. What is the opposite direction of buying a house and settling down with a mortgage and need for steady employment?

Why, packing up (again), loading everything into a UHaul, and moving to the family farm in Flathead Valley, Montana...to build an earth berm shelter (of course!).

Both my husband and I had stopped doing earth berm planning because it seemed that was a far off dream and we needed to focus on the present. Then suddenly we were building the house now with no time to waste. We moved in with my in-laws (bless their generous hearts) and my husband and father-in-law got to work on a model and quickly moved on to the actual house. We didn't have time to do a thorough plan and we didn't have the time and knowledge needed to create a budget. We just started doing it, using Rob Roy's Earth-Sheltered Houses as our main guide.

We basically started at Summer Solstice 2014 and are now nearly 5 months into the project (though we lost close to a month at the start waiting for permits and legalities). The budget is $50K ($20K would have gotten us the well, septic, and maybe foundation) and there is no wiggle room there--once we hit $50K, we stop because we are out of money. We are hopeful that we will be moving in to the shell before Winter Solstice 2014 and then we will work on the inside for the next...decades...

In some ways, this story sounds crazy and in many ways it totally makes sense for us. I will post some of the specifics of this process soon(ish) and you can check out pictures on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/tinyabundantlife?ref=aymt_homepage_panel